


That one time Jay was a Disney Princess

by jaythewriter



Series: Misplaced Attachments [9]
Category: Marble Hornets
Genre: Gen, M/M, also a deer named reggie, it's really cute and kind of self-indulgent in me wanting to see jay being cute, part of the Misplaced Attachments saga, rather takes place after MA and the other three post-MA fics
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-05-18
Updated: 2014-05-18
Packaged: 2018-01-25 16:08:54
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,784
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1654541
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jaythewriter/pseuds/jaythewriter
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Jay goes missing and is found by Alex and Tim in an unexpected place— with an even more unexpected (and adorable) companion.</p>
            </blockquote>





	That one time Jay was a Disney Princess

**Author's Note:**

> Reggie is not entirely my creation; they would not exist if it weren’t for my friend Rose helping me out and encouraging me to write the world’s most adorable deer ever.

“Tim? Can you c’mere?”

 

Tim straightens up in front of the kitchen sink, narrowing his eyes at the sound of Alex calling his name.

 

Frankly, no, Tim would rather not ‘c’mere’. He’s doing his share of chores around the Kralie home and is in a mess of soap and bubbles up to his elbows with a dirty dish in his hands. Christina told him that she would get to the dishes herself, but he decided that she had enough to do with three boys around the house— two of them unemployed.

 

At first, he thinks he can get Alex to get off his back by ignoring him. He drops the rest of the utensils used at dinner tonight into the sink and lets them soak at the bottom of the basin. Drying his hands on the flowery towel hooked around the refrigerator door handle, he then leans over the sink to switch off the water flowing from the faucet, and-

 

“Tim! What the fuck, come here, you gotta see this!”

 

Bubbles jump into the air as Tim slams the last of the plates into the sink. Okay, that didn’t work as well as he’d hoped.

 

“Fine!” he shouts back, flicking his hands to the side to wave away all the soap clinging to them. Glaring towards the open back door that Alex vanished through when Tim started on the dishes, he crosses the kitchen and steps out into the backyard. Golden light emanating from the setting sun illuminates Alex’s silhouette from beyond the unlocked gate, swinging about in the blustering breeze.

 

“Come look,” the tall man demands once again. Tim tries his best to reign in any passing paranoid thoughts that maybe he should be afraid of what Alex wants to show him. It’s been so quiet around here these past months; surely that’s not about to change on a simple Thursday night after a quiet day off from the animal shelter?

 

Ever cautious, Tim walks as quietly as he can towards Alex, glancing towards the forest standing tall in the not-too-far-off distance. Nothing out of the ordinary stands out against the shuddering greenery, though Tim doesn’t allow himself to look for long for fear of actually seeing something.

 

“What is it?” Tim asks, forcing a steady tone once he’s at Alex’s side. The man’s neutral face makes it impossible for Tim to judge whether he ought to be worried.

 

“I think I found out where Jay went on that walk of his,” Alex answers with raised eyebrows.

 

That does nothing to settle Tim’s pattering heart. Jay walked out after dinner with a gritting jaw and a flushed face, declaring that he needed to go be alone for a while. Nobody went after him, though Tim had to practically hold himself down to keep from darting out the back door with him. He understood that Jay was an adult and that he could take care of himself (well, for the most part anyway), but Tim is too used to looking after him at all hours of the day. It’s a hard habit to break when such a habit was what kept Jay from, well, /dying/.

 

Nonetheless, he deserved that time alone. Between Tim and Alex today, the comments on his intelligence and slight lack thereof must have gotten to be too much. Jay kept asking silly questions for the sake of writing his novel accurately, and neither of his companions responded too kindly.

 

In retrospect, Tim wishes that he hadn’t laughed so much at Jay asking whether dogs are truly aware if they are dogs and if dogs think humans are dogs too. It was such a Jay thing to ask though and Tim couldn’t stop himself, and… maybe it came across too mean.

 

“Is he okay?” Tim asks straightaway, though upon second thought, he doubts Alex would be this calm if Jay was hurt. Regardless, it’s Alex’s slow half-smile that manages to soothe the frantic whirlwind that was Tim’s brain.

 

“Come see for yourself,” he says simply. With that, he lifts one long leg into the air and climbs over the log lying off to the side of the dusty dirt path that leads from the gate to the forest. He jogs across brittle dying grass that breaks beneath his feet, and soon enough Tim is at his side, positively aching with curiosity.

 

Up ahead, a small gathering of evergreens stands several feet from a neighbor’s house, surrounding a hill that slopes over enough to act as a protective ceiling for whoever may want to hide beneath it. Dead yellowing grass gives way to green soft blades that somebody laying beneath the hill is using as a bed, and, yes, that somebody is Jay, lying on his front with his arms curled beneath his head as a pillow.

 

He’s not the only one that’s resting there, though.

 

Tim isn’t sure that he’s seeing what he’s actually /seeing/ here but he is, a fucking deer is curled up on top of Jay, small enough to pass for a baby and patches of white speckled all over its otherwise tan back.

 

Alex holds a finger to his lips, slowing his pace and tiptoeing along to keep from disturbing the scene before the two of them. Tim follows his lead, puzzled but fascinated; Jay constantly speaks of the deer that make it into the Kralies’ backyard but he never said anything about making /friends/ with any of them.

 

The two men manage to approach close enough to see the way the baby deer rises and falls with each even breath Jay takes in his sleep. One of them, though— Tim can’t tell if it was him or Alex— steps a bit too close and snaps a twig beneath their shoe.

 

Abruptly lifting its head, the deer glances between the two intruders, wide ears flicking around. Tim freezes in place, arms going into the air in a surrendering pose. He doesn’t know why he does it; it’s not like the deer understands what the gesture means. It looks to him with glinting black eyes, radiating suspicion.

 

“…Hey, no,” Alex says gently, daring to inch closer. “We’re not gonna hurt you, we just can’t let our friend stay— Shit!”

 

Tim bites his cheek; it takes way too much effort to hold back his laughter at Alex getting scared by a /deer/. The tiny thing jerked its head in his direction when he came too close and squealed in warning, though it didn’t make any move to flee as most deer might. Alex stands with his hands raised in a similar fashion to Tim, a good ten feet away from the deer now.

 

“Alex, wait,” Tim hisses when he scoots a foot forward through the dirt. “I think it might actually be trying to protect Jay.”

 

The taller man whips his head around to scowl at Tim.

 

“That’s stupid, deer don’t do that. It probably saw Jay sitting here asleep and thought he’d make a good bed. It’ll get scared once he wakes up— oh… see?”

 

As if on cue, though more likely from all the commotion going on around him, Jay begins to stir, arms coming out from beneath his head and stretching out before him. He shudders from the stretch, whimpering softly and arching his spine. The deer rises up into the air with the movement, though it doesn’t even twitch at the sudden disturbance.

 

Bleary blue eyes take in their green surroundings, from the grass that tickles Jay’s nose to the hill that shields him from the very last rays of the sun. Recognition slowly sets in and he shrugs, as though nonplussed to be waking up in the middle of wilderness. It’s then that he realizes he isn’t alone as he cranes his neck and sees the two other men standing close by, looking equal amounts of ridiculous and cautious with their raised hands and wide eyes.

 

“…well,” he murmurs, sitting up slowly. His hooved companion slides off of him, hitting the ground with a squeak and straightening up to be barely taller than a sitting Jay. He looks to his friend and grins fondly, extending a hand to scratch the deer’s head. It leans into his touch, eyes lidding over in contentment. “I see you’ve met Reggie.”

 

Tim practically feels Alex’s incredulous blink from here.

 

“Reggie, huh?” Tim says around a cough, not much better than Alex in hiding his disbelief. It’s not every day one finds out their boyfriend is actually a Disney princess. Jay, meanwhile, continues to smile as though nothing about this is odd, hugging Reggie around the neck with one arm.

 

“Yeah. They come around the yard sometimes and hang out,” he explains. Reggie tilts their head and headbutts Jay in the neck as gently as possible. The deer receives more scratches in return, this time underneath the chin. They arch out their neck, eyes closing and nose wiggling with a soft sigh. “I think their mom was hunted down so they know to stay safe they should come be with me.”

 

It would figure that Jay had found an orphan and decided to be its new mom. Tim still recalls the tiny ducklings that he found peeping away underneath the motel bed once while Jay wasn’t entirely lucid. It took about an hour of frustrated yelling and convincing to get him to return the children to their mom, who was in fact sleeping and not dead as Jay had thought.

 

Ducklings Tim could handle— a deer, though, a deer that is clearly not finished growing and may very well hate anything that isn’t Jay…

 

“Well, it’s time for Reggie to go back home now,” Alex declares, and for once Tim agrees with him. He attempts to close the distance between them, taking a step towards the pair on the ground, though Reggie immediately makes it clear they’re not having any of it. They stamp a hoof into the dirt and whine, long and shrieky.

 

“Okay, this is stupid,” Tim huffs. He points at Reggie with an accusatory finger, receiving an icy black eyed stare in return. “Tell it to back off, would you, Jay? We need to get home before dark.”

 

"/They/ won’t go away, they followed me and wouldn’t leave me alone," Jay corrects Tim sternly. He pets the deer’s head anyway, coaxing them to stand down, though they remain at his side as he climbs to his feet. "I can’t help it if they figured out what made me upset earlier— I dunno how they did, but, Reggie’s smart and they’re a good deer."

 

As though the little beast understood Jay’s words, their tail gave a sudden happy flicker, wagging back and forth much like a dog’s would.

 

Heat rises into Tim’s ears at the reminder of what it was that brought Jay out here. He doesn’t need to look in Alex’s direction and take the hint from his guilty shuffling about; the discomfort radiates off of him.

 

"Listen, Jay, I— you do know that I don’t think you’re legitimately stupid, right?" Alex asks, nerves cracking his voice. The smaller man’s face goes unchanged, though something about the image of him stroking Reggie slowly and repetitively reminds Tim of those old films with heads of evil organizations holding their equally evil cats and petting them while revealing their dastardly plot.

 

"Same here, Jay," Tim pipes up hopefully. "You just caught me off-guard earlier. Honestly."

 

Jay tilts his head to the side, humming in thought.

 

"I don’t think either of you see me as stupid, but I failed to hear an apology from either of you right now."

 

Something in Jay’s high-and-mighty tone must’ve snapped Alex’s permanently thin patience, because the man attempts to rush at Jay, demanding he stop playing games— only to be held up halfway by Reggie rearing up on their back hooves and kicking out at him.

 

Being such a young deer, the strike couldn’t have hurt much, but it still takes Alex by surprise. He trips over his own feet and nearly plummets to the ground. Quickly finding his balance, he attempts to flee from the deer as they come prancing toward him.

 

Of course, the deer proves to be faster than him. Alex topples over face first into the dirt, grunting between grit teeth, and he makes a move to push himself back up—

 

"Nyeh!"

 

He freezes, realizing that Reggie is standing atop him and looking around casually, as though he’s not even there.

 

All the while, Tim remains where he was, not even considering that /maybe/ he should help Alex. He’s far too busy holding his gut and laughing though. Not once in his life did he ever expect to see a baby forest animal go chasing after Alex Fucking Kralie, let alone actually manage to pin him down in the process.

 

Jay is in a similar state, though he’s collapsed on the ground, unable to hold himself up with the force of his giggles. It’s bad enough that tears are trickling down his cheeks, and his shoulders shudder with silent laughter after a moment or two of Alex whining ‘what the /hell/’ repeatedly to himself while Reggie squeaks at him every time he attempts to escape.

 

"S-say uncle!" Jay gasps from over beneath his grassy hill. Tim looks to him with cheeks aching from smiling, certain in every way that this no longer has anything to do with getting an apology.

 

"Fuck you!" Alex yells back, only to shrink into himself as Reggie begins to nibble at his shoulder. "Oh god, make them stop it—"

 

"Y’know, some deer actually eat meat when they get really hungry," Tim teases while biting the inside of his cheek hard to stifle himself somewhat. "If that one’s an orphan, then they must be preeeetty hungry…"

 

"Shut /up/!" Alex shrieks, voice breaking from the force. "Jay, please—"

 

"Reggie!"

 

Similar, once again, to a dog, the deer turns their head and perks their ears up. Obediently stepping off of Alex, Reggie trots over to Jay’s side, tail waving rapidly.

 

"G-good Reggie, there’s a good Reg," Jay gasps out, burying his face in the deer’s head as he throws his arms around their neck. As sweet as the scene is, Tim can tell Jay is using the deer’s fur to wipe his tears of mirth away, though Reggie hardly appears to mind.

 

Alex bitterly regathers his bearings, pushing off of the ground and brushing the earth from his front. He jabs his glasses back into place on his irritably crinkled nose and whirls to face the other two men.

 

"Was that really necessary?" he growls. Tim nods immediately, although Jay gives a more ambiguous answer in the form of a sly smile hidden in Reggie’s neck. The deer goes on attending to the evident love of their life, preening and licking through Jay’s hair.

 

It’s difficult for Tim to decide who to pay attention to; Alex fussing around like this is entertaining in itself, but Jay’s murmuring something too quiet to be heard into Reggie’s ear, as though the deer can understand him. Hell, they even seem to nod when he points back to the woods down the path.

 

Sometimes Tim thinks he’s seen it all, but then Jay had to go and turn into the deer whisperer.

 

"I needed that," Jay sighs, watching the deer flounce off into the distance, head held high and hooves flying higher. He smiles guiltily, turning his gaze upon Alex and approaching him cautiously. The taller man keeps his arms crossed, though he doesn’t flinch away when Jay comes up on his toes and presses a kiss to his lips. "I’m sorry, I won’t let that happen again. I swear on my laptop and every file on it."

 

"That’s a pretty serious swear," Tim encourages gently, trying to soften the glower glinting in Alex’s eyes. It works, to some extent, with his arms dropping to his sides and his mouth coming down to kiss Jay’s forehead in return, though Tim doubts he’s going to stop being surly for the rest of the night.

 

"C’mon, let’s get back to the house," Jay suggests eagerly, popping ahead of them and jogging up the path towards home. Alex limps along, tail between his legs and head bowed.

 

Tim follows, remembering the unfinished chore waiting for him back in the kitchen sink.

 

As resistant as he was to being interrupted in the middle of his task, this was definitely worth taking a quick break for. Maybe he should join Jay in the backyard more often and look out for more deer that’ll follow the blue-eyed man’s every order.

 

Having them around might come in handy if Alex decides to be particularly annoying for whatever reason.


End file.
